Discovery Early Career Researcher Awards (DECRA)

Critical Dates

Following the ARC’s National Competitive Grants Program (NCGP) review, the DECRA scheme is expected to undergo changes in future rounds. Click here for further details.

2027 DECRA

11 March 2026

Scheme closed

25 May to 5 June 2026

Anticipated DE27 Rejoinders open and close

10 December 2026 to 9 March 2027

Anticipated DE27 Outcomes

Overview

Discovery Early Career Researcher Awards (DECRA) supports early career researchers who have typically received their PhD in the last five years or have eligible commensurate career disruption.

The DECRA scheme aims to:

  • support outstanding early-career researchers with demonstrated capacity for high-quality research and emerging capability for leadership and supervision;
  • foster collaboration, with national or international researchers;
  • support excellent and innovative research that addresses a significant problem or gap in knowledge and represents value for money;
  • create new or advanced knowledge resulting from the outcomes of the research with economic, commercial, environmental, social and/or cultural benefits for Australia; and
  • advance promising early career researchers and promote enhanced opportunities for diverse career pathways in high-quality and supportive environments.

SELECTION CRITERIA

The criteria weighting is as followed:

  • Investigator/Capability: 35%
  • Project Quality and Innovation: 35%
  • Benefit: 15%
  • Feasibility: 15%

FUNDING

The scheme provides funding for up to 200 projects per round. Funding is awarded by the ARC of up to approx $176,693 per annum for three years, with a per annum salary contribution of approx $126,693 (this includes 30 per cent on-costs), and up to $50,000 per annum for project costs. Project costs can be used to hire research assistants, support HDR students, or fund equipment, consumables, field research, travel, and dissemination costs. See Section 5 of the Discovery Program Grant Guidelines - Fellowships (2024 Edition) for more information.

ESTABLISHMENT GRANTS FOR ARC DECRA

Establishment Grants are internal University of Melbourne grants that support ARC DECRA recipients at the university. To be eligible for Chancellery support, matching funding must be provided by the host department/school/faculty on a 1:1 basis. Applications for Establishment Grants should be requested at the ARC DECRA application stage. Each faculty has their own internal requirements to apply for this grant. Refer to Establishment Grants for ARC DECRAs for details on how to apply.

C2 ADMINISTERING ORGANISATION LETTER OF SUPPORT

IMPORTANT: It is mandatory for your ‘C2 Administering Organisation Letter of Support’ to be submitted for review and approval. As this is an official statement from the university, a final version needs to be officially approved through RIC before it is uploaded it into RMS.

Please note that this letter must be written by the applicant in consultation with the proposed host School/Department/Faculty. The requirements for review vary depending on faculty. Please view your faculty requirements here. When drafting your statement, you must use the university approved template and consult the university guide (these two documents can be accessed below under Supporting documents > RIC Documents and Resources).

SCHEME LIMITS

Candidates may be nominated for the DECRA twice over the period in which they are eligible. This includes applications that are withdrawn after the grant closing date or those that are deemed ineligible.

For information regarding project limits under the ARC Discovery Program please consult the Grant Guidelines.

ACTIVE PROJECT AND ACTIVE PROJECTS ASSESSMENT DATE

An Active Project refers to an ARC Project that is receiving funding according to the terms of the original Funding Agreement, or has any carryover funds approved by the ARC, or an approved variation to the Project’s end date. Therefore, if a project has carried forward any funding and the end date has changed, the NEW end date determines if the project is active. Active projects can be viewed via the applicants RMS profile by selecting Person Profile > Current ARC Projects> End Date. Please note that projects with Final Reports due are not considered active projects.

The Active Project Assessment Date is a scheme-specific date which considers Active Projects (as per the above definition) and Projects under assessment. This date is important as it is used to assess applicant's cross-scheme eligibility, i.e. whether they are within the limits of the number of ARC applications and projects a participant can be named on.

The ARC will calculate active projects as at the closing time of submission of Proposals (and may calculate this rule again as other scheme rounds’ announcements are made and End of Year Reports are submitted).

The key dates for the DE27 round are:

DE27 Funding Commencement Date: 1 January 2027

DE27 Active Project Assessment Date: 1 July 2027

Note: An applicant cannot apply for a DECRA if it will put them over the project limit at the Active Project Assessment Date. For the purposes of eligibility, both awarded projects and under assessment projects counts towards project limits for the DECRA scheme. For example, an applicant can apply for the DECRA scheme if they have one Discovery Project (DP) (either awarded or under assessment) which ends after the Active Project Assessment Date. However, an applicant cannot apply for the DECRA scheme if they have two Discovery Projects (either awarded or under assessment) that will end after the Active Project Assessment Date.

RIC RESEARCH DUE  DILIGENCE

The Research Due Diligence function provides advice, guidance and recommendations on the potential reputational risks associated with undertaking research activities with external partners.

Due diligence assessments are conducted on a project-to-project basis.

Where an activity requires additional specialist assessment, your arrangement may be referred to other teams for parallel review. For example, projects involving sanctions, export controls, or potential foreign interference risk may also be assessed by the OREI International safeguards and research security team.

Further information and enquiries:

RESEARCH OUTPUTS

Research outputs must first be added to an applicant's ARC Research Management System (RMS) profile before they can be selected for inclusion on an application. The University's recommended approach is to export research outputs from Elements as a BibTeX file and then import this file into RMS to achieve best data integrity.

Please contact your local Faculty Research Office or research-outputs@unimelb.edu.au for help with the process or to amend data in Elements.

Further resources to assist with managing Research Outputs are available below under Supporting documents > Research Outputs.

REQUEST NOT TO ASSESS

If you have a conflict of interest with a researcher from an external institution it is possible to request that they not be considered as a potential detailed assessor for your application. More details about this can be found on the ARC Request Not to Assess webpage.

DE27 Consultation Sessions

If you have questions regarding eligibility and compliance, or perhaps questions regarding the submission process, please book time to meet with a RIC staff member.

Sessions are intended to be short (15-minutes) and are available for booking between 12-1pm on the following days:

  • Wednesday 28 January 2026
  • Thursday 29 January 2026
  • Monday 2 February 2026
  • Wednesday 4 February 2026
  • Friday 6 February 2026

To book your session, please use this link.

How to apply

  1. Submit a Notice of Intent (NOI)

    The Cayuse NOI should be completed early to provide RIC with your contact details.  For further information see our quick guide or the UoM:  Cayuse NOI Guide : Research Gateway.

    Note: You cannot submit a DE27 application without a Cayuse NOI.

    External applicants:

    Please contact your incoming HoD/HoS or Faculty Research Office to enquire about a guest account in Cayuse.

  2. Update RMS profile

    Candidates must obtain access to RMS and update their profile information (see RMS information)

  3. Review documentation

    Review the Grant Guidelines, the Instructions to Applicants and the Changes documents.

  4. Complete the draft application

    Log on to RMS to complete the draft application. Note that applications will only be available in RMS from Wednesday 28 January (official DE27 opening).

  5. Administering Organisation Letter of Support

    Work on the Statement with your supervisor and Department/Faculty.  Please see Faculty specific review instructions here.

  6. Eligibility Exemption Request

    If applicable, complete the Eligibility Exemption Request form. This is a spreadsheet that details career interruptions for applicants whose PhD was awarded prior to the DE27 eligible PhD award date of 1 March 2021. The form is available here.

    This form must be sent to ric-arcgrants@unimelb.edu.au by Monday 2 February so that RIC can arrange for the DVC(R) to certify eligibility.

  7. NIT, C2, RIC and ExpERT Review Instructions

    Mandatory by 10am, Monday 9 February: A5 NIT statements must be uploaded in RMS. RIC will do a bulk extract and share your NIT statements with your faculty.

    Mandatory by 10am, Monday 9 February: C2 letters for applicants from ABP, ARTS, MLS and MDHS must be submitted to RIC via the Qualtrics survey (if participating in RIC and/or ExpERT reviews). For further information on ExpERT reviews, please refer to the RIC resources. If you do not want a RIC or ExpERT review and you are from one of the above faculties, please email your C2 letter (in Word format) to ric-arcgrants@unimelb.edu.au.

    Optional by 10am, Monday 9 February: If you would like to receive a RIC review for eligibility and compliance and/or if you wish to participate in CRE's ExpERT panel reviews, you must submit a Qualtrics survey form by this date.

    Note: you do not need to send RIC a copy of your application. We will download all applications in bulk on Monday 9 February.

    *A review ready application consists of:
      • Part A - Administrative Summary complete
      • Part B - Participant Details including ROPE complete
      • Part C - Project Description (reviews will benefit most from a C1 that is largely complete; in the case where certain sections are missing, RIC will provide generic guidance on how to complete missing sub-sections.)
      • Part D - Project Cost must be complete
      • Part E - Classifications and Other Statistical Information complete
      • Part F -  Project Eligibility

    **PLEASE NOTE

    All applicants (regardless of whether submitting application for RIC review) MUST upload their NITS (National Interest Test Statement, Section A5) into RMS by 10am, Monday 9 February. This allows for your NITS to be viewed and approved by your Faculty prior to DVC(R) certification. NITS must be approved and certified by the DVC(R) prior to submission of your final application to ARC.

  8. Application review

    RIC staff members will review the application and provide the applicant with feedback via Cayuse 'Tasks'.

  9. Complete the application

    After taking feedback from the RIC team into consideration, complete the application in RMS. It is suggested advice is sought from colleagues, Faculty Mentors, etc. before finalising the application.

  10. Final submission

    By 10am, Wednesday 4 March 2026, the applicant must:

    • Submit final application by clicking ‘Submit to Research Office’ in RMS

    Note: RIC will complete the final check on applications that are changed to "Submitted to the Research Office" in RMS. We will download final applications in bulk and review them in order of submission. RIC will communicate any major eligibility issues via email.

  11. RIC will submit the application

    Once the application has been submitted to ARC, you will receive an email from RIC confirming submission.

Close

Supporting documents

ARC Documents and Resources

RIC Documents and Resources

(UoM login required for some of the following documents/links. Please email ric-arcgrants@unimelb.edu.au or your faculty research office if you require copies)

Research Outputs

Seminars

Rejoinders

Note: Assessor comments should only include details on Investigator/Capability, Project Quality and Innovation, Benefit, and Feasibility. Assessors should not be commenting on Eligibility and Compliance. If you identify an assessment that contains inappropriate elements you may wish to have this reviewed by the ARC. You can do this by completing an ARC Assessment Review Request form within 3 working days after the opening of the Rejoinder period. Please note that applicants should never contact the ARC directly. Always speak to your Faculty or RIC first.

Contacts

DECRA questions and primary email
ric-arcgrants@unimelb.edu.au

Key contacts

Leah Sullivan 

Carrie Liang

 

+61 3 8344 2012

+61 3 8344 0440